§ Mr. JenkinTo ask the Secretary of State for Social Security when the Benefits Agency Fraud officer for North Essex will be contactable by e-mail; and if he will make a statement. [114978]
§ Mr. RookerThis is a matter for Peter Mathison, the Chief Executive of the Benefits Agency. He will write to the hon. Member.
Letter from Peter Mathison to Mr. Bernard Jenkin, dated 16 March 2000:
The Secretary of State has asked me to reply to your recent Parliamentary Question asking when the Benefits Agency Fraud officer for North Sussex will be contactable by e-mail; and if he will make a statement. We understand that there was an error in the question and that it should have read North Essex not Sussex.Until recently we did not have in place a secure gateway from our internal e-mail system to the Internet to allow safe communication with those outside our system. This is now in place and instructions have just been issued to staff for its use. Over the coming months the e-mail addresses of BA District and other offices will be published on the DSS Web site. A timetable has not yet been finalised. A number of constraints remain to be resolved in terms of confirming identify and ensuring security before restricted or personal information can be sent by e-mail but these are being addressed.We have not yet, however, put in place the structures within offices to deal with a high volumes of enquiries but an arrangement can be made for specific cases and I understand that this option has been made available to you by the Fraud Sector manager. I hope this is helpful.